Ovid’s words seemed of particular relevance this week. A week of commemoration has been a time to look back to the horrors of not so long ago but it has also been a time to pause and take a look around at how things stand today.

It has been a time to be thankful for the peace this country now enjoys and to pay homage to what that peace has brought.

Like most commonplaces, those about peace are usually forgotten in times of peace. And like most commonplaces, they are profoundly true.

Peace is the condition required for education, the arts, and the formation of human relationships. It is when music can be made, crops sown, houses built.

Peace gives society time for reflection, from where most good things start. This is what the people of Goma, as described in our main story this week, are marching for.

They are marching for a chance to be given the opportunity to grow and flourish as this country has. This magazine is in effect each week a tribute to peace.

That we can revel in the pleasure that fashion, entertainment, comedy and gossip bring is a result of the peaceful times we now live in.

So go ahead and enjoy but let us also bear in mind the prerequisites for such a magazine and let us in spirit at least stand with those Congolese so that their songs of peace might drown out the sound of guns.

Ends